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spyritwind2 said, about the regen changes:
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The dev's were never able to back up thier exaggerated claims. They were still determined to make the changes regardless. They were unwilling to admit thier claims were wrong
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Statesman said, when the mistake was found:
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So what are going to do? First, APOLOGIZE. Yeesh what a mistake. Thank you all for putting me to task. Second, I've put a hold on pushing I4 live until we retest the Scrapper defensive sets (and we'll post the results again). If the changes are too much, we'll roll them back as we've done before. But under NO circumstances will the current Regen changes go live until we own up to our mistake and retest. And I'll continue to interact with the community on the results!
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. . .I know who I have more respect for.
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Statesman admitted that the tests were wrong, but they never backed off from their claims that regen scrappers were "unparalled". And the only tests they showed was with a primary that would make Regen look its best.
My arcs are constantly shifting, just search for GadgetDon for the latest.
The world beware! I've started a blog
GadgetMania Under Attack: The Digg Lockout
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...Try to understand that I am speaking out of frustration because I was looking forward to the arena so much. After testing it out, however, I lost interest very quickly. I tested SEVERAL DIFFERENT CONFIGURATIONS of blasters on the test server before i4 came out.
I started out in the arena using my lvl 50 nrg/dev blaster.... To my shock and amazement, to fight any form of scrapper was a waste of time. I was not an equal, but a mere punching bag for just about any form of scrapper I fought. ...
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You might want to check your tactics.... I had the same experience from the scrappers point of view (meaning good blasters used my regen scrapper as a punching bag.... couldn't get near them, but then I'm a teleporter... not the best for PvP.)
Ahh yes hovering above the scrapper sniping him again and again is so fun and easy-unless he also has hover.......
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The BIGGEST benefit of posting numbers is that, when dev's introduce major changes, ...
a.) potentials for abuse can be more easily noticed.
b.) potentials for bugs can be easily identified.
c.) players can follow the logic of the dev's and, hopefully, flame less.
d.) players can feel more confidant in their power & slotting choices.
e.) If done right, game balance can be tracked by both dev & player.
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While I understand your argument, this is something I don't exactly agree with. Because you want to start to introduce the numbers into the mix, people start seeing their characters as less of a "character" and more of a jumble of statistics and figures. It becomes less about creating a character you enjoy and more about being worried about how your character performs without that extra .08 of damage.
In the end, to me at least, I think the more "numbers" and "statistics" you have available to you, the greater the risk of cheapening the game and the more destructive it becomes to the enjoyment of the game.
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It is not a measure of me "wanting" to have numbers in the game, as it is more of a measure of players "needing" numbers in the game.
For a captain to effectively lead a team, TF or super group, they have to know how the measure the efficiency of their team. Would you rather have someone with 1 Heal, as opposed to 4 or 6, as your team healer?
1 DefBuf as opposed to 6 for defense shields?
6 Damage and no Accuracy for your scrappers / tankers?
The first two reasons listed for posting numbers are to make it easier to identify existing / potential problem areas.
The last three reasons focus solely on providing
1.) players a means to understand dev choices
2.) dev's a means to understand good vs. bad development choices.
We could understand why perma-Anything was undesirable to the dev's in both a PVE / PVP sense, because the player disproportionately uses Nth level powers at the exclusion of others, which is not what the dev's intended.
If we play PVP, we ARE going to want to know why we lose more often when our builds lack efficient slotting. Otherwise, we get disappointed and play a different hero which, MAY OR MAY NOT, be better slotted.
If we have the ability to know about how to slot better we enjoy the game longer.
We don't really have an in-game sensei or police academy training course to push us to better limits as heroes, but it would be nice to know whether or not I can effectively take on 5 as opposed to only 2 minions.
Yes, we now have an arena, but why not more advanced tutorials.
Ones that could teach about varying aspects of teaming?
Ones that could be like a police academy training course?
There's a reason why most of us do not slot most of our damage powers with 6 Damage enhancements.
We balance Accuracy vs. Damage and know we want to NOT miss.
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If I missed something - I apologize - i'm exhausted. I will revisit in the AM but feel free to send me a PM as well.
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I think you're working above and beyond the call of duty. I'm sure I speak for many of us when I thank you for your efforts, as well as those of the Devs.
Cuppa, Dev guys...
I don't hate you - and I don't hate the changes. Changes to any game just change the game - if I love it and I do, I'll adapt.
But that doesn't mean I don't see things differently than you and want things differently. I am one of those people who frequently jokes that "The Devs hate my AT", and I have to admit to some extent ... it's not all joke.
When you consistently are told something is being looked at for your AT ... and nothing happens or worse ... you get nerfed. You tend to feel the Dev Gods are against you.
As an MC, I've always had the weakest of everything - except holds - what happened to me? I, as well as every other AT which relies on them (other controllers and defenders) got my holds nerfed for Arena through the use of BF's - which you should have seen in testing. The rest of us did.
Yet - we got nothing in return to help us in Arena, granted - in the early days of Arena on Test if there was a scrapper or a tank i just gave up ... now I can survive against them for a while but ... making the envitable outcome of a battle the same but just prolonged isn't balance guys.
In the Arena, you created temp powers for every other AT class to assist them - BF's, Stuns, Web Grenades, even fly hover, stealth, jump ... but what did those who control get?
I don't see a temp power to increase my damage. I don't see a temp power there to allow my holds to work against a break free. So if I feel I got shorted in that - perhaps there is a reason I feel that way. If I feel I was not represented, then show my where I was so I can feel as if you do care about my AT.
I'm sorry if you're recieving mean spirited posts - those are not the core of the game community. You guys work damned hard (I know because I build software too - dev is a hard path when you have users picking over everything). You turn out a good product. (I know there's a lot of issues with I4 - this was not a minor upgrade it was a major change to code on multiple levels - great job guys. There's bugs an then there's bugs - these are livable and being worked on. You rocked with this release and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.)
But... I've seen it posted over and over - and I tend to agree, a Blaster should be able to blast and be a damage king, a tank should be able to tank, a scrapper scrap and a controller control.
I can hold them ... sometimes ... if they don't have a BF.
My suggestion for helping us - would be the ability to fire off more controlls faster. Make them run through those BF's or make the BF's only last about 3 seconds. That would be fair. A very - very slight increase in damage would be nice but - hey that is giving us more of an advantage. I'd rather remove the issue nerfing us out of any use - than get the damage if I had to choose.
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...Try to understand that I am speaking out of frustration because I was looking forward to the arena so much. After testing it out, however, I lost interest very quickly. I tested SEVERAL DIFFERENT CONFIGURATIONS of blasters on the test server before i4 came out.
I started out in the arena using my lvl 50 nrg/dev blaster.... To my shock and amazement, to fight any form of scrapper was a waste of time. I was not an equal, but a mere punching bag for just about any form of scrapper I fought. ...
[/ QUOTE ]
You might want to check your tactics.... I had the same experience from the scrappers point of view (meaning good blasters used my regen scrapper as a punching bag.... couldn't get near them, but then I'm a teleporter... not the best for PvP.)
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Hover does no good against any scrapper that has the terror effects. I'm talking about a lvl 50 battle here... not a lvl 10...
Lol I don't have a 50 quite yet but I do ave a 43 and I'm not too familiar with Scrapper builds so I'd die if I would ever TRY to solo one.
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Best. Thread. EVER.
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ditto
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Let me try this again. Try to understand that I am speaking out of frustration because I was looking forward to the arena so much. After testing it out, however, I lost interest very quickly. I tested SEVERAL DIFFERENT CONFIGURATIONS of blasters on the test server before i4 came out.
**SNIP**
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Something to keep in mind is that the arena still is, and will be for some time, a work in progress. Balancing PvE is hard enough. However, Balancing PvP is downright insane if you want any semblence of fairness. At the same time, Cryptic is still "new". City of Heroes is their first game, and theres still a learning process going on. (Even after a year). I mean, heck, SoE still can't even pull off good PvP.
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IMHO, this is a critical mistake Statesman is making. He's so hell bent on protecting the virgin sensibilities of his "average" player that he doesn't see that there are people out there who simply want to enjoy playing the game a different way. I absolutely refuse to believe there is any negative to putting more information into the game, because information can always be ignored. But information can be consumed unless its there.
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To be honest, I believe there IS a negative to putting more information in. Because in a way, I think it actually causes people to feel like they are forced to do things a certain way. In a way, it tends to force people to "quantify" their fun. This is often demonstrated by people who enjoy themselves UNTIL they get to the forums, where suddendly they learn that they are "gimped" or "below average" as they become exposed to the numbers or the people wielding the numbers.
But I do see where your coming from, EG. The question now is how to balance the desire of those who want the numbers, with trying to keep things from devolving into a simple stat-fest.
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I guess that kind of nullifies your 'everyone else' statement, though... I think there are more like us who are bringing up the topic, not just the min/maxers.
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Yeah, I really shouldn't have used "Everyone else", as that really came off as assuming that everyone else is a Min/Maxer, which wasn't intended. That was really a bad choice of words on my part.
Now, on something else you brought up about the Pen and Paper games (Like Dungeons and Dragons)... In a Pen and Paper game, the knowledge of Stats and numbers is actually less damaging then in an MMO. (Of course, keep in mind this is just my opinion.) The reason for this is because of the DM.
Unlike in an MMO, the DM can adjust the game on the fly, changing difficulty, making adjustments, and generally keeping the flow of the game. This, of course, means a good DM can prevent things from degenerating into a simple matter of who has the best stats and gear. Especially considering that a good DM can adapt to provide a fun experience for all different playstyles.
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It kinda makes me feel a little sad that such a reassurance is needed in the first place.
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Bears repeating. I love you guys... you truly ARE the best Dev team I've ever experienced. You deserve so much more respect than you get.
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Something I've always wondered...
Why do people feel the need that they *have* to be "Optimal" to have fun? Why does everything have to boil down to the numbers?
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Well, sometimes I think casual players could go about their business happily not knowing the numbers. When you are slotting damage, the difference between four slots of damage and five slots of damage is kinda what you intuitively expect, whether you know the numbers or not.
The problem comes for attributes in the game that are not well behaved. Resistances, for example, don't work like that. You are building to a cap, and anything less than the cap can be catastrophically less (the difference between 90% resistances and 70% resistances is you are going to take three times the damage, which is kinda a lot).
If you didn't know how recharge worked, you might think that slotting recharge would be a reasonable alternative to damage - shoot faster instead of harder (even with the end drain). The problem is the game engine (wrongly in my opinion) doesn't count activation time as part of the recharge cycle, so recharge doesn't have the effect you think it might - there is no way to slot power blast so you can fire it continuously; at some point, the recharge is totally wasted (it starts off only partially wasted).
Honestly, in my opinion the game mechanics were not designed for casual intuition to work right, something that should have been fixed from the start if the game was intended to be "numbers-blind."
[Guide to Defense] [Scrapper Secondaries Comparison] [Archetype Popularity Analysis]
In one little corner of the universe, there's nothing more irritating than a misfile...
(Please support the best webcomic about a cosmic universal realignment by impaired angelic interference resulting in identity crisis angst. Or I release the pigmy water thieves.)
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Let me try this again. Try to understand that I am speaking out of frustration because I was looking forward to the arena so much. After testing it out, however, I lost interest very quickly. I tested SEVERAL DIFFERENT CONFIGURATIONS of blasters on the test server before i4 came out.
**SNIP**
[/ QUOTE ]
Something to keep in mind is that the arena still is, and will be for some time, a work in progress. Balancing PvE is hard enough. However, Balancing PvP is downright insane if you want any semblence of fairness. At the same time, Cryptic is still "new". City of Heroes is their first game, and theres still a learning process going on. (Even after a year). I mean, heck, SoE still can't even pull off good PvP.
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Ok... I get the fact that cryptic is new. so what? that just means they should actually listen to their customers more. And quite frankly... it doesn't appear that they care at all what we think. They "change the game for the better." shouldn't the customer decide what better is? I wouldn't be shocked at all if a mass exodous took place from that simple fact alone.
Something I don't understand is why there is this need for complexity in game mechanics when a simpler mechanic would eliminate the need for "the numbers" and would reduce the number of places and points where possibly exploitable bugs could happen. As a software developer I know that the more complex a system I write that a) the harder it is to maintain over time and b) the more prone to errors and unforseen interactions with other systems it is.
Take resistances. Why isn't resistance instead of being a percentage reduction of damage of a given type taken, a simple literal damage reduction. So the base resistance to smashing is 100, that means the first 100 points of smashing damage taken is ignored. Then, each enhancement increases the amount of damage reduction as appropriate. Then, "resistance" becomes trivially easy to balance against damage. Balancing the resistance defenses of a tanker against the offfenses of a blaster (which seems a good benchmark) is a simple comparison.
Similarly, recharge reductions, endurance reductions, etc. Instead of a scaling reduction. Have each reduction offer a set % reduction of 5 (training), 10 (DO), or 15 (SO) and then worst case with 6 SO enhancements in a power deveoted to reduction you get a new value that is 20% (6*15=80) of the base. If they are all +3 then its 2%, or effectively instantly recharging, so perhaps 2,7,12 or thereabouts.
The point being that by simplifying how powers work numbers become less necessary, balance becomes easier to achieve, and focus can be on providing challenge in content, not in trying to guess whether or not you're at a cap. Just design powers such that 6 enhancements of the most powerful type is within the desired power liimts.
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Let me try this again. Try to understand that I am speaking out of frustration because I was looking forward to the arena so much. After testing it out, however, I lost interest very quickly. I tested SEVERAL DIFFERENT CONFIGURATIONS of blasters on the test server before i4 came out.
**SNIP**
[/ QUOTE ]
Something to keep in mind is that the arena still is, and will be for some time, a work in progress. Balancing PvE is hard enough. However, Balancing PvP is downright insane if you want any semblence of fairness. At the same time, Cryptic is still "new". City of Heroes is their first game, and theres still a learning process going on. (Even after a year). I mean, heck, SoE still can't even pull off good PvP.
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Ok... I get the fact that cryptic is new. so what? that just means they should actually listen to their customers more. And quite frankly... it doesn't appear that they care at all what we think.
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Guess you haven't seen all the things poeple asked for put into the game since launch.
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They "change the game for the better." shouldn't the customer decide what better is? I wouldn't be shocked at all if a mass exodous took place from that simple fact alone.
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Sure ... the customer could deside what is better ... IF all the customers could agree on what "better" is.
Hasten was "nerfed into uselessness" over 10 months ago, now it's a problem that needs to be taken care of. Four such threads have been stared in the last 2 weeks, or so, alone. Many others have been started over the months since the "nerfing."
Who's right?
The ones that said that Hasten is useless or the ones saying it's a "must have" power?
NCIS: Best gorram show in the 'verse.
-------------------------
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To be honest, I believe there IS a negative to putting more information in. Because in a way, I think it actually causes people to feel like they are forced to do things a certain way. In a way, it tends to force people to "quantify" their fun...
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Maybe I'm not the majority of players, but personally, I am mining the guides for info and then I build the charcter I want using the guide stats. This allows me to make the character that fits my concept best.
For instance... no matter how many people tell me TP foe is a useless power, I'm not changing that part of my build. It fits my scrapper's origin and the playstyle I've developed for him. Actually, when soloing, I use TP Foe more than I do some of the 'recommended' attacks he has.
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... Unlike in an MMO, the DM can adjust the game on the fly, changing difficulty, making adjustments, and generally keeping the flow of the game. This, of course, means a good DM can prevent things from degenerating into a simple matter of who has the best stats and gear. Especially considering that a good DM can adapt to provide a fun experience for all different playstyles.
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Absolutely. As I've said before, we don't need all the formulas or exact numbers, only a little more info if we're going to make informed decisions. I only used the pen and paper example to illustrate that knowing the rules doesn't automatically make you a min/maxer. (I've had some poor DM's who could only go by the written rules, for instance.)
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... And quite frankly... it doesn't appear that they care at all what we think. They "change the game for the better." shouldn't the customer decide what better is? I wouldn't be shocked at all if a mass exodous took place from that simple fact alone.
[/ QUOTE ]
Well... I'm not sure where they'd 'exodus' to. It's pretty well established that, though it seems at times the devs have ignored the customers (gone ahead with an undesired change, and in some cases not even communicating that change) they still have a better track record than any of the other major games.
I don't know,...the dev's for Star Wars Galaxies are pretty awesome... 
Oh, and have you met my little friend, Mr Crack Pipe...? 
** ...turns to look at reviews for "Rage of the Wookies"... **
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I don't know,...the dev's for Star Wars Galaxies are pretty awesome...
Oh, and have you met my little friend, Mr Crack Pipe...?
** ...turns to look at reviews for "Rage of the Wookies"... **
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Did you notice how the newest 'combat update' brings SWG's combat professions a bit closer to CoH's AT's?
Had to laugh at them trying to peg everyone as either Damage Dealers (ranged and melee), Tanks, Healers, and Crowd Control. Not exactly the same (and you can mix professions) but awefully similar.
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Exactly. I haven't slavishly taken Tough/Weave on my Regen precisely because I knew that Stealth offered a decent defense buff only slightly less than Weave and offered as a level 6 power.
Information could lead to singular builds, but I don't think that it will.
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Yeah... exactly. I did decide to get Tough, though, when I realized it provides almost 4 times the resistance that Resilience does..... I was a little surprised by that, seeing as how the descriptions are similare (one says 'some resistance' while the other says 'slightly resistant').
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Tough is a toggle, Resilience is inherent; Toggle powers are always more powerful than inherent powers.
"But in our enthusiasm, we could not resist a radical overhaul of the system, in which all of its major weaknesses have been exposed, analyzed, and replaced with new weaknesses."
-- Bruce Leverett, Register Allocation in Optimizing Compilers
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Exactly. I haven't slavishly taken Tough/Weave on my Regen precisely because I knew that Stealth offered a decent defense buff only slightly less than Weave and offered as a level 6 power.
Information could lead to singular builds, but I don't think that it will.
[/ QUOTE ]
Yeah... exactly. I did decide to get Tough, though, when I realized it provides almost 4 times the resistance that Resilience does..... I was a little surprised by that, seeing as how the descriptions are similare (one says 'some resistance' while the other says 'slightly resistant').
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Tough is a toggle, Resilience is inherent; Toggle powers are always more powerful than inherent powers.
[/ QUOTE ]
...and we know this because we have the numbers to back it up...
spyritwind2 said, about the regen changes:
[ QUOTE ]
The dev's were never able to back up thier exaggerated claims. They were still determined to make the changes regardless. They were unwilling to admit thier claims were wrong
[/ QUOTE ]
Statesman said, when the mistake was found:
[ QUOTE ]
So what are going to do? First, APOLOGIZE. Yeesh what a mistake. Thank you all for putting me to task. Second, I've put a hold on pushing I4 live until we retest the Scrapper defensive sets (and we'll post the results again). If the changes are too much, we'll roll them back as we've done before. But under NO circumstances will the current Regen changes go live until we own up to our mistake and retest. And I'll continue to interact with the community on the results!
[/ QUOTE ]
. . .I know who I have more respect for.
Mini-guides: Force Field Defenders, Blasters, Market Self-Defense, Frankenslotting.
So you think you're a hero, huh.
@Boltcutter in game.